Wednesday, 5 February 2014

Three companies have been given court convictions
for making unsolicited marketing phone calls and sending spam emails. Energy
company Airtricity Ltd, clothing chain Next and Pure Telecom are the latest
firms to be successfully prosecuted at Dublin District Court by the office of
the Data Protection Commissioner. The case was taken after the watchdog
received complaints from members of the public about being contacted for
marketing purposes.

Judge William Hamill noted yesterday the
companies had pleaded guilty at an early stage to charges under the Data
Protection Act, and had contributed to the costs of bringing the case. But he
refused to spare them recorded convictions. Pure Telecom was fined €500,
Airtricity has to pay a €75 fine and Next was fined €100. Assistant Data
Protection Commissioner Tony Delaney told Judge Hamill that one woman had used
Next’s unsubscribe facility to stop getting spam from the clothing chain. However,
that did not work and on February 25th and February 28th last year she received
more marketing emails from the company. “One of them was a gift idea for
mother’s day,” Mr Delaney said adding that they were, “typical marketing emails
but clearly when she had opted out she should not have been getting them”.

Complaint

Judge Hamill noted the company had no prior
convictions and that Next had used a third-party company to handle the
unsubscribe process but has since stopped dealing with them.

In relation to Pure Telecom, Mr Delaney said his
office received a complaint from a man with an ex-directory phone number who
had received two promotional cold calls last March.

Judge Hamill was told Pure Telecom had been
fined €1,250 in 2010 for a breach of data protection regulations. The company’s
director Paul Connell said the calls came from a third-party agent which has
since been dismissed, and he apologised to the complainant.

The court also heard a man with an ex-directory
phone number had received a call on May 10th last offering a promotion on
behalf of Airtricity which had then been using a third-party sales company to
handle a promotion.

Judge Hamill heard this company had been using
an old computer with an out-of-date call list from 2009.

The court heard Airtricity had no prior
convictions but had been given a formal warning in 2010 in relation to other
complaints.